Ann Patchett's life on the run

"I don't want to go," she mock-wails, then changes her tone to cheery optimism.

AP

"I bet it'll be really good this time."

Patchett is an expert on book tours, having gone on them for more than 15 years and having written "My Life in Sales," an essay about her road-trip adventures for the summer fiction issue of The Atlantic Monthly. She dispenses practical advice from one author friend, Clyde Edgerton ("drink plenty of water"), and something more sage from another, Allan Gurganus ("the only thing worse than going on book tour is not going on book tour").

Ann Patchett is sitting on her couch in Nashville, snuggling up with her 13-year-old dog, Rose, and thinking about leaving the next day for a book tour.

Not going is not an option for Patchett. Sure, it's in her contract that she has to tour, but she's a trouper who spent her early touring years changing clothes in the bathroom of the nearest McDonald's and combining bookstore appearances with freelance work for Bridal Guide. Her audiences grew steadily from her first novel, "The Patron Saint of Liars," through "Taft" and "The Magician's Assistant" and the breakout success of "Bel Canto" and her most recent novel, "Run." Along the way, she noticed something obvious that doesn't get mentioned very often: People weren't showing up for the current book but the previous one.

"Even for the paperback," she said. "'Bel Canto' did not sell in paperback, not at the beginning. It was still 'The Magician's Assistant' for a while."

Whichever book draws them in, Patchett makes sure to keep them entertained once they get there. She said she's taken "all sorts of polls" and found that about half the audience really wants her to read and the other half would rather not. "At the risk of being vain, I'm a really good reader," Patchett said, but she keeps it short, "15 minutes max, and then chatter."

It wouldn't take too much longer than that for Patchett to read "What now?" the commencement address she gave at her alma mater, Sarah Lawrence College, that was published as a book this year to critical acclaim.

"The funny part about that is I had so little to do with it," she said. "It's almost like the book I didn't write. I didn't do any publicity, I didn't tour, and it did really well. I never stressed about it."

Patchett said "What now?" isn't as successful as Maria Shriver's "And One More Thing Before You Go," an expanded version of a high-school graduation speech, but "it gets to snuggle up next to it in the stores." She credited a great cover design by Chip Kidd and an editorial assist from Gurganus, her old teacher at Sarah Lawrence, who saw a copy of the speech she planned to give and suggested she cut the high-flown rhetoric and talk about her life. She did, and the result was wild applause and an unexpected success.

After 45 minutes of chatter, Patchett realizes it's time to hang up and pack for her tour. Ever the salesman, she reminds her Portland audience that she'll be on a paperback tour for "Run," the first novel she's written that has a short, catchy title that could fit on a license plate.

"I know," she said, "but as soon as I wrote it I start getting asked about my new novel, 'Gone.' What can you do?"